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Facebook Profile Glitch 'Kills' Millions, Even Mark Zuckerberg

A glitch on the social media site found people logging in to their
accounts on Friday, only to find they had been prematurely
‘memorialized’

Rumours of Mark Zuckerberg’s death may have
been greatly exaggerated – but by his own billion-plus user website, as a
glitch on Friday afternoon led Facebook to declare two million users,
including Zuckerberg himself, prematurely dead.

People logging in
to their accounts to find that they had been “memorialized”, with a
message saying (in Zuckerberg’s case): “We hope people who love Mark
will find comfort in the things others share to remember and celebrate
his life.”

Just a day earlier, Zuckerberg had said the
idea that fake news on Facebook could sway people in their voting
decisions was “crazy”.

At time of writing, at least four Guardian
US journalists are among those who were declared by the social media
giant to have shuffled off this mortal coil.

Facebook
apologised for the glitch and explained that it was related to the
social network’s protocol for ‘memorializing’ a person’s page when they
do actually die.

The company planned to introduce the new
messaging to existing memorialized pages, but mistakenly displayed it on
two million other accounts.

“For a brief period today, a message
meant for memorialized pages was mistakenly posted to other accounts.
This was a terrible error that we have now fixed. We are very sorry that
this happened and we worked as quickly as possible to fix it,” said a
spokeswoman.When the message appeared, hundreds of dismayed users complained on Twitter about their premature digital deaths.

Facebook
does allow users to memorialize the accounts of deceased family members
or friends by submitting a formal request . Typically they must
identify the account of the person who has died, the date they passed
away and show proof of death, such as a link to an obituary or death
certificate. “This is very helpful to the team that reviews
memorialization requests,” says Facebook.

If a request is
accepted, the word “remembering” is shown next to the person’s name and
the profile no longer appears in public spaces such as suggestions for
People You May Know, or for birthday reminders.

Users can appoint
a legacy contact while they are alive to manage their account when they
die. If a user fails to do this, the profile is preserved but can’t be
edited.

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Facebook Profile Glitch 'Kills' Millions, Even Mark Zuckerberg

A glitch on the social media site found people logging in to their
accounts on Friday, only to find they had been prematurely
‘memorialized’

Rumours of Mark Zuckerberg’s death may have
been greatly exaggerated – but by his own billion-plus user website, as a
glitch on Friday afternoon led Facebook to declare two million users,
including Zuckerberg himself, prematurely dead.

People logging in
to their accounts to find that they had been “memorialized”, with a
message saying (in Zuckerberg’s case): “We hope people who love Mark
will find comfort in the things others share to remember and celebrate
his life.”

Just a day earlier, Zuckerberg had said the
idea that fake news on Facebook could sway people in their voting
decisions was “crazy”.

At time of writing, at least four Guardian
US journalists are among those who were declared by the social media
giant to have shuffled off this mortal coil.

Facebook
apologised for the glitch and explained that it was related to the
social network’s protocol for ‘memorializing’ a person’s page when they
do actually die.

The company planned to introduce the new
messaging to existing memorialized pages, but mistakenly displayed it on
two million other accounts.

“For a brief period today, a message
meant for memorialized pages was mistakenly posted to other accounts.
This was a terrible error that we have now fixed. We are very sorry that
this happened and we worked as quickly as possible to fix it,” said a
spokeswoman.When the message appeared, hundreds of dismayed users complained on Twitter about their premature digital deaths.

Facebook
does allow users to memorialize the accounts of deceased family members
or friends by submitting a formal request . Typically they must
identify the account of the person who has died, the date they passed
away and show proof of death, such as a link to an obituary or death
certificate. “This is very helpful to the team that reviews
memorialization requests,” says Facebook.

If a request is
accepted, the word “remembering” is shown next to the person’s name and
the profile no longer appears in public spaces such as suggestions for
People You May Know, or for birthday reminders.

Users can appoint
a legacy contact while they are alive to manage their account when they
die. If a user fails to do this, the profile is preserved but can’t be
edited.

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